In the 6th grade we were picked to spend a week on Cape Cod, kind of a science week, living in dorms, measuring tide pools, collecting data. Coincidentally my best friend and I were both picked (I can still remember telling my mother when I got home, as she gardened in the yard: "You BOTH are going?!" ahh destiny). The yellow bus took us there, with our stuffed duffle bags, full of clothing and diaries and books and pencils.
We arrived on a windy, cloudy day. As if there are any other days than that on the Cape. Just ask the Kennedy's. New England has as much cloud cover as Seattle does, if the sun shines, we blink and our eyes tear.
We decamped the bus to the seashore, the spray tossed into our eyes and nostrils, it was freezing. We were starving. Like the miracle of the loaves and fish, the counselors and teachers put together this amazing spread in minutes. Peanut butter and fluffer-nutter sandwiches on white bread, fried chicken, still warm and sticky with salt. Cold milk to wash it down with. Seagulls barking above us, circling in endless hope of a handout. Potato chips. And we ate and the flavors and the sea salt and the wind made the perfect meal. Nothing has ever come close. Sometimes perfection only happens once.
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Nikki Stern
BuffyW
Sally Swift
Lainey
Kathy Knechtges
odetteroulette
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